Artist's Statement. 

The subject of the body has always intrigued me within the context of art, and I have explored this fascination in many ways throughout my practice.

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Fashion and the body are strongly connected, and I believe clothing and art can be one and the same. Contextually, feminine archetypes inform my practice—often beginning with Greek mythology and continuing to be reaffirmed throughout history.

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My work delves into how these conceptions remain prevalent in today's society. It focuses on fashion and textiles, body image, and the female experience in the modern world, exploring how the depiction of the female figure in art and popular culture influences the narrative of women today in everyday life.

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Working with canvas and oil pastels is important to me because they symbolize a popular traditional idea of art. Generally speaking, most Western canonical artists use canvases and oil paint. To me, the process of taking this strong, durable fabric, deconstructing its traditional purpose, and making it into a garment is an act of resistance against ideas of where the line between everyday functional objects and fine art lies.

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The duality of the strength and construction of the durable fabric of the canvas, with tailoring inspired by men's suits, paired with the natural feminine form depicted using soft, malleable oil pastels, both being deconstructed, abstracted, and manipulated by how the fabric naturally falls and how it is cut, folded, and sewn, questions the typically masculine control surrounding both art and fashion as well as women’s bodies and how they are seen.

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The way the oil pastels behave on the material when it’s manipulated shows the marks of labor, becoming a live piece of work. I don’t stop the materials from doing what they naturally do. The material not being completely joined on seam bends, the oil pastels spreading and marking when the canvas is folded to sew, fingerprints and smudges—another implication of the body, being absent but obvious.